Not on Our Watch (28 page)

We motor over to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and file inside. The setting is that of an official reception, quite formal, and after being seated and offered tea, Mr Yafei informs us that regrettably President Hu will be unable to meet with us but he (Yafei) will surely remit all of our concerns to his boss. Disappointed yet undaunted, the delegation jumps right into our pre-planned salvo: Given your (China’s) economic interests (re: oil trade) in the government of Sudan, can your government do more to help stem the tide of violence and misery? We are aware of your ‘back-door’ diplomacy efforts, but is there any way we (public figures, talking heads) can publicly give voice to what you are doing, pay you some credit, and generate support? What message can we take back from you to our US leaders and the UN regarding this issue? We gingerly bring up China’s appalling human rights record, then segue directly to the Olympic Games being held there in 2008, making the point that the world will be watching and having a bloody confrontation raging out of control in a country wherein China invests heavily and has great influence will do little to bolster their shining slogan for the games of ‘One World, One Dream’. Minister Yafei is as affable a man as you could care to meet. He listens patiently, counters intelligently, and advises us to caution our leaders against attempting to militarily force a solution down President al-Bashir’s throat, stressing that such an attempt, especially from Western powers, would only exacerbate the deteriorating situation of Darfur. The meeting ends inside of an hour to little fanfare with snapshots and fare-thee-wells carrying us to the door. Before we exit, however, David Pressman, George’s advisor and organiser of our trip, reiterates our desire to, as promised, have an audience with President Hu. David is politely rebuffed with assurance that we have, de facto, spoken to the President already.

In the car back to the Hyatt we all decide to call off the remainder of our scheduled meetings/photo-ops in consideration of quid pro quo; we knew how we would have been used and we were fine with that, but the door of propaganda has to swing both ways, and they had just locked theirs, surprise, surprise.

We wrap up our China trip the next day, hop on a Turkish Airlines flight to Istanbul, transfer planes, and head to Egypt to meet with President Mubarak, his son Gamal Mubarak (the General Secretary of the Policy Committee), Gamal’s mother, Her Excellency First Lady Suzanne Mubarak, and Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit.

The plane ride is long and productive, giving us ample time to compare notes on our first visit and readjust our strategy for our next hosts, who have a decidedly intimate relationship with Sudan, sharing their southern border with her. Egypt is regarded by many as being one of the political and cultural centres of the Middle East and, one would believe, has a vested interest in taking whatever steps are possible to prevent yet another Arab-ruled nation from being pulled apart by internal conflict, especially if the result could be a reduction in the flow of the vital Nile River waters from Sudan to Egypt and the prospect of a surge of refugees streaming into their country from further Sudanese civil war.

We land, immediately pour into our cars, and head to our first meeting with Gamal Mubarak at the Dar Al-Quwwat al-Janniya (Air Force Club) in Heliopolis. Upon arrival we are brought into a large room with a huge table set for breakfast, a very welcome sight for starving travellers. Moments later our host swoops in. President Hosni Mubarak’s youngest son has been described as being quite ‘presidential’ himself—a very fair description. With an MBA from the American University in Cairo, ‘Mr. Gamal’ has all the bearings of a man groomed to eventually take the reins: handsome, erudite, and thoroughly informed on the issues. After the preliminary meet and greet we are invited to sit, and then (really should have seen it coming) déjà vu rears its ugly head. Mr Gamal announces that we will unfortunately be unable to meet with the president due to scheduling conflicts. I start to wonder if these presidential meetings were ever going to happen in the first place. Were we fools to believe that these heads of state, or any head of state for that matter, would really care what a couple of actors and athletes think? However, in the same fashion as our China meeting, in response to our questions and suggestions, Mr Gamal thanks us for our passion, informs us that he will look for ways to do everything within his power to advocate for protection for the Darfurian civilians, yet cautions us (the West) against seeking military solutions. He flags our president’s unfortunate use of the word ‘crusade’ post–9/11, assuring us that it had indeed reverberated extremely negatively throughout the Arab world, even in Egypt, considered a ‘friend’ of the US. Apparently our delegation, if nothing else, can serve as a whipping boy of sorts for the current administration and he gives us an earful. We listen diplomatically before interjecting that ours is not a mission to defend or decry US policies but rather a call to find common ground for solutions.

Our subsequent meetings with American University of Cairo students, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, and the First Lady, yield only Her Excellency pledging to host a summit in Egypt to raise awareness for the women victims of the Darfur conflict as well as her offering to travel to Chad to more strongly engage Arab interest and support to end the bloodshed. The wrap-up is familiar: photos, handshakes, and ‘welcome back anytime’s. The remainder of our Egypt leg is uneventful, simply marking time until wheels up, continuing on to New York and the UN.

Inside those hallowed halls, our delegation’s sit-down with Secretary-General Kofi Annan, Deputy Secretary-General Mark Malloch Brown, and others proves to be another exercise in frustration. The press reports we saw the day before we arrived, stating that on 1 January 2007, the US and UK would consider enforcing a no-fly zone to patrol the skies over Sudan, seemed to be a ham-handed tactic that no one in the room thinks is feasible or actionable even, yet we find ourselves struggling to nail down effective alternative solutions. Mr Annan and Mr Brown agree that we’ve visited the right players in the game of ‘who’s got the stick’ with regard to influence over the Sudanese leadership, but we all doubt seriously that the stick will be effectively utilised. Mr Annan encourages us not to give up the fight and to be sure to interface with his successor, Ban Ki-moon, and the special envoy to Sudan to be named in January, the very month that the African Union’s budget runs out. Happy New Year. Will funds be cobbled together to finance more troops, their numbers still too small to patrol the region, their mandate lacking real power to protect the innocent? Will the US and UK seriously begin flying sorties over the deserts of Darfur? Could that possibly help? Does anyone know what to do? Does anybody really care? I want to scream and break things. But I don’t. I’m too polite. Maybe everybody is.

We head home loaded down with more questions than we departed with and I seriously contemplate getting rid of my BlackBerry, but that wouldn’t stop the buzzing in my head. What’s next?

As if on cue, my BlackBerry chirps. Here we go again. Do I even dare pick up?

‘Buddy, buddy. Welcome back, my man.’

‘Sup, John?’

‘Mission accomplished. The highest ranking delegation to China and Egypt on Darfur, huh?’

‘I know, it’s crazy,’ I reply. ‘No cabinet members, no foreign minister. Just actors and athletes.’

Then I give John the lowdown on the state of affairs and my state of mind. His tone changes immediately.

‘Look, I hear you on the obstacles, but did you already forget? Not on our watch. There are so many more things that can be done to end these atrocities that haven’t yet been tried. Rome wasn’t built in a day. The Iraq Study Group had 79 recommendations! Do you think Sudan is less complicated? The movement finally has got Bush’s attention, and he’s demanding action. Now is the time to pick up the beat, to increase the temperature, to make more noise. What did Martin Luther King used to say?

‘Oh, man, quoting Martin now?’

‘You got anybody better? King said, “The moral arc of the universe bends at the elbow of justice.” And if Dr King doesn’t do it for you, there’s this book you and I wrote called Not on Our Watch. You should read it, again.’

‘And you should have heard all that diplomatic pseudo-sympathy on that trip.’

‘Been there, done that, and will again.’

Neither of us talks for a beat. What’s left to say? All there is is what’s left to do. John breaks the silence.

‘And listen, as soon as this thing gets turned around in Darfur, I got two tickets for us to go to Congo.’

‘Round three, huh?’

‘Yep. And bring the rock.’

‘Yeah, I hear those kids over there got game.’

Later that night, in the relative quiet of my house, I play back the tapes of all that’s happened vis à vis Darfur since I’ve become ‘involved’. Times like this, it’s easy to feel powerless, easy to feel alone. But when I take off those blinders and look around I see that I am actually surrounded by many people ‘intending the light,’ as Joseph Campbell says, hoping against hope to make a difference in their time. I grow inside as we grow in size, not an army of one but one of many taking up the gauntlet thrown at our feet. Millions of lives hang in the balance, their futures determined in part by whether or not we act. Ultimately, I pray that we not stand down from our post. Not us. Not now. Not on our watch.

Appendix

Taking Action: Things You Can Do Immediately

1. Raise awareness.

a. Stay informed, and inform others, about what’s going on in Darfur.

The ENOUGH Project seeks to unite and strengthen the efforts of grassroot activists, policy makers, advocates, concerned journalists, and others by giving them up-to-date information from on the ground in countries of concern and offering practical pressure points to end the violence. If you are concerned about these issues and want to know what you can do to push for change, www.enoughproject.org is the place to find answers.

The International Crisis Group has field analysis and up-to-date policy recommendations for how to resolve conflicts all over the world, including Darfur. www.crisisgroup.org.

Eric Reeve’s website (www.sudanreeves.org) is a great one-stop shop for news, analysis, and advocacy about the conflict.

Download the Voices on Genocide Prevention podcast from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum at http://www.ushmm.org/conscience/podcasts/.

Encourage friends to go to www.darfurisdying.com and play mtvU’s Darfur video game.

b. Subscribe for the latest news from organisations working to stop the atrocities.

- Genocide Intervention (GI-Net) sends out regular ‘action alerts’ with specific Darfur activism opportunities.

http://www.genocideintervention.net/advocate/actionalerts/.

- To subscribe to STAND’s national newsletter, sign up here:

http://inform.standnow.org/lists/?p=subscribe&id=2.

- Save Darfur has a Weekly Action Network with specific actions you can take each week to help make a difference.

http://www.democracyinaction.org/dia/organizationsORG/darfur/signUp.jsp?key=1596.

- Africa Action also features innovative action alerts, at http://www.africaaction.org.

c. Write an op-ed or letter to the editor of your local newspaper.

Save Darfur (www.savedarfur.org) has a great feature that allows you to write letters to the editor of local and national newspapers.

http://www.savedarfur.org/page/speakout/dailies.

Here are some of their tips to help get your letter published:

- Most newspapers will only print original letters. Use talking points and sample letters as a starting point for your own message.

- Letters with a personal angle are always compelling. Ask yourself how this issue affects you and your family.

- Keep it brief and to the point. Letters under 200 words are much more likely to be published.

d. Write to the TV networks and encourage them to cover Darfur.

Visit www.BeAWitness.org and learn more about efforts to push the television networks to devote more time to the crisis in Darfur. Here’s a sample letter they will help you send to the networks:

Dear Sir/Madam:

I am writing to urge your network to devote more airtime to covering the ongoing genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan, where as many as 400,000 people have died, thousands of women have been raped, and more than two million people have been forced to flee from their burned and bombed villages to live in squalid refugee camps.

Television has the unique ability to put a human face on statistics. A good news story can bring Darfur, one of the most remote places on earth, directly into our living rooms. Sadly, television news coverage of Darfur has been woefully deficient. Only one in every 950 minutes of news coverage during 2004 covered Darfur. In the US during June 2005, major news media aired 50 times as many stories about Michael Jackson and 12 times as many stories about Tom Cruise as they did about the genocide in Darfur.

Genocide is newsworthy. By increasing your coverage of events in Darfur, you can help to generate the public attention needed to pressure our government to bring the atrocities to a halt. I urge you to give this crisis the attention it deserves.

Sincerely,

2. Raise funds.

Here are tips for a successful fund-raising event (courtesy of GI-Net):

GENERAL TIPS FOR HOLDING EVENTS

- Decide what type of event will be most effective for the goals you are aiming to accomplish. For example, would a film screening or speaker better suit your purpose for holding the event?

- Test your idea out—ask a few friends what they think. Consider what kind of resources you will need to make it a success.

- Get a team together, rather than working on your own. Make a list of tasks; find out what skills people have, and try to give them tasks they’ll enjoy. Make sure everyone knows what his or her responsibilities are.

- Come up with a backup plan. For example, what will you do if it rains?

- Do research and estimate how many people might turn up. What is the minimum number of people you’ll need to make money? What’s the maximum number of people you can accommodate?

- Think about the best date. Avoid competing with another local function or a major TV event, for example. Agree on a realistic timetable and give each task a deadline.

- Think of ways to keep costs down and your proceeds up. Try to get as much as you can for free—whether it’s people’s time, a venue, food, publicity, printing, commercial sponsorship, or prizes.

- Bring materials about the current situation in Darfur and the Genocide Intervention Network (GI-Net). You can request flyers, brochures, or other materials by e-mailing [email protected].

- Remember to thank everyone involved and let them all know how much they’ve raised.

- Above all, make it fun!

QUICK EVENT IDEAS

- Host a Dinner for Darfur. These dinner parties are meant to act as fund-raisers, and are a way to educate your community and give them the tools for action. For an easy guide to hosting an educational fund-raising dinner, go to http://www.genocideintervention.net/fundraise/dinners.php.

- Virtual house parties will get your friends and family involved in the cause with minimal effort.

- Screen
Hotel Rwanda
or a similar film demonstrating the need to stop genocide.

- Selling stylish GI-Net T-shirts is an ideal way to spread the anti-genocide message. If you are willing to commit to selling at least 30 shirts, you can buy them at a good discount and sell them on, either at cost value to ensure you make a lot of sales, or at a slightly higher price in order to bring in more revenue. You can set whatever price you think makes sense for your event. Then you can make a donation with the money you raise.

- The Save Darfur Coalition also has green wristbands that have become one of the emblems of the Darfur movement. Purchase a few, then ask for a donation for each one and help make Darfur activists more visible!

- Set up a donation box around your school, workplace, dining hall, or place of worship. Distribute information about mass atrocities.

- Ask local musical groups to perform at a ‘battle of the bands’. Charge admission or set up a donation box at the event.

- Have a bake sale or car wash. Explain prominently that the event is to help protect victims of genocide in Darfur.

- Organise a tournament involving poker, video games, a dance marathon, etc. Charge admission from the participants of the event. You can either give a small portion of the proceeds to the winner or have it be a ‘benefit tournament’ with all winnings sent to the anti-genocide cause.

- Local businesses often look to promote philanthropic causes. Educate them and see if they would be willing to make a donation.

- If there is a Darfur-related event outside your area, encourage your religious organisation or other group to sponsor your travel expenses.

3. Write a letter.

There are many different ways to write to elected officials and urge them to take action to stop atrocities in Darfur. Personal letters stand the best chance of being noticed, and we gave you an example of what a letter could look like in Chapter 8.

The GI-Net website also has a great tool for quickly generating good, effective letters. http://www.democracyinaction.org/dia/organizationsORG/ginetwork/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=4591.

4. Call for divestment.

The website of the Sudan Divestment Task Force (www.sudandivestment.org) has a wealth of information about the status of ongoing divestment campaigns, and everything you need to know to start a new campaign if none exists where you live.

You can learn the basics of targeted divestment at http://www.sudandivestment.org/divestment.asp.

After you learn the basics, contact the Task Force at [email protected]. A Task Force/STAND (Students Taking Action Now: Darfur) representative will work with you to create a customised plan of action for your institution. You will be able to ...

- Research your institution to find how it may be invested in Sudan

- Submit a targeted divestment proposal to your institution’s investment manager (e.g., treasurer, board of trustees, controller/comptroller, president, state legislator).

- Mobilise a grassroots coalition to support your proposal.

5. Join an organisation.

Joining an existing organisation is the best way to stay up to speed on news, events, and opportunities to get involved in stopping genocide.

a. Students

Students should visit the STAND website to find out how they can get involved. http://www.standnow.org/

b. Congregations

Congregations can learn more by joining the Save Darfur Congregational Network and taking advantage of their Faith Action Packs, with specific resources to help Christian, Jewish, and Muslim communities mobilise to help the people of Darfur. http://www.savedarfur.org/pages/organize_your_congregation.

For instance, here are samples of scripture, texts, and traditions that they suggest:

PROVERBS 3:27

Withhold not good from them to whom it is due, when it is in the power of thine hand to do it.

ADAPTED FROM AL-QUR’AN, SURAH 5:32

He who has killed an innocent soul, it is as if he had killed all humanity. And he who has saved an innocent soul, it is as if he has saved all humanity.

JAMES 3:17–18

Peacemakers who sow in peace raise a harvest of righteousness.

c. Communities

Community organisations have played a critical role in pushing for action on Darfur. At the Save Darfur website, you can search for groups in your area, or learn how to organise your own group. http://www.savedarfur.org/page/group.

6. Lobby the government.

a. Find out your representative’s record on Darfur.

The first step to lobbying officials is to find out what they have or haven’t done to make a difference on Darfur. Visit www.darfurscores.org and look at a US representative’s record on Darfur and use that as a basis for checking the record of your own representative. Find out if there is a similar record for your own parliament.

b. Ask focused questions.

Attend public events featuring members of congress and ask them about their position on Darfur. Here are some tips from GI-Net:

-
Investigate local media, blogs, and word of mouth to find out when a political event involving members of parliament or challengers will be held.
If it is an invitation-only function, inquire about how to get invited. Usually organisers will be happy to invite people who sound co-operative and reasonable.

-
Use the Darfur scorecard (www.darfurscores.org) to see where a member of Parliament stands on Darfur-related activities.
With this knowledge, you will ask a more pointed and effective question.

-
Your question should be short and pointed.
If you think you might get flustered, write the question down on a note card ahead of time.

-
Look for other chances to get your point across if you can’t ask a question directly.
If you were not called on or there was no question-and-answer session, you still have options. If there is a handshake line, join it and ask an abbreviated question while getting your ten seconds with the candidate. Try to approach campaign staff after the speech and ask if you could meet with them about their candidate’s Darfur agenda. Ask local media representatives if they would be interested in writing a story mentioning the candidate’s Darfur policy.

-
Be sure to follow up with the campaign, either by e-mail or phone, after the event.
This will remind the candidate that yours is an important issue on which he or she needs to take a position.

c. Meet with elected officials.

Making an appointment to meet with a member of Parliament isn’t as tough as it sounds. You voted for them, and you have a right to tell them exactly how you feel about the issues that matter to you.

Five Helpful Hints for Advocacy Initiatives

There are five elements we would recommend that you keep in mind when you are talking with elected officials or making presentations to interested citizens. For this purpose, we propose the ‘KIS’ organising framework:

1.
Keep It Simple
: Focus on the basics of your message. Try your best to limit your pitch to three points. If you count more than three, you are officially out of control.

2.
Keep It Short
: Policy makers and most of the public hate history lessons. They will stop listening and start daydreaming. Maintain your focus and keep it concise.

3.
Keep It Sound
: Give a short overview and a clear list of what your audience or interlocutor can do.

4.
Keep It Smart
: Keep the focus on what your country can do. Don’t talk about oranges to the director of apples. Know your audience.

5.
Keep It Special
: Tell an amazing and/or personal short story that everyone will remember to illustrate your point.

Seven Deadly Sins of Human Rights Advocates

Beware of the Seven Deadly Sins of would-be human rights advocates like us. We can get pretty sanctimonious, long-winded, and overzealous. So here are some things to avoid when you are trying to make your case, whether to a politician or to a group of people you are trying to educate.